You are not a North-Indian? :O November 6, 2007

“I thought you are north Indian!!!”, “Ah? Kerala? No kidding!”, “Kerala? No way”, “Where are you from? Delhi?”, “Are you Bengali? You look like Sourav Ganguly” (I used to in 1st year of college ) are some of the common question asked by people I meet. When I see that the other person is fluent in hindi, I join the conversation in the same language. In between when I say that I am from kerala they look at me in disbelief. People ask me how I am so fluent in hindi being in kerala. Now two things….

1. Most of the people in Kerala knows hindi. The literacy rate there is very high.

2. Remember in the first post of this blog I had studied in KV NAD. Well being in a defence are 90% of my classmates didnt know malayalm. So hindi was the medium of communication. 6 years of life in defence area is more than enough to be well fluent in hindi I guess.

Infosys Interview- Day 2 November 6, 2007

 

21st July 2006: Gurunath Sir (PO) had asked us to reach college at 8am and lazy me got up at 8am only to realise that I had interview on that day. I managed to reach college only by 10:15am (MTC drivers are real slow, dont blame me ). They were collecting mark sheets and i had reached just in time. The 14 of us waited, waited, waited…. slept, woke
up, washed face, again slept, woke up, wahed face…. This process continued for 3-4 times until evening 3:30pm. Finally our college was called. Our college was the last slot since we were the nearest to the venue. We got information that they were asking puzzles in the interview. I was sure that i would be trapped in that. Finally we were called and was asked to wait in front of the interview room. I waited in front of the interview room for about 2 hrs. I was the last person, ie I was
teh 179th candidate.
While waiting i talked with a guy who was working at Infosys and was having my marks with him. I was desperate to know how I cleard aptitude. Finally the guy, secretely showed me my marks. It was 37/50 in aptitude and 30/40 in verbal. He said the cut off is 24. Thank god! Finally i was called at around 5:00pm. I had hidden the MP3 recorder in my pocket to
record the conversation. What was going through my mind was, even if i didnt get the job, i would have a fine recording to show off. The HR was a lady in her mid 30s. The following are the exact transcriptions from the recording: 

Me: Good evening madame
HR: Please take your seat. 
Me:Thank you madame
HR:May i have your resume
Me:Sure madame
[She goes throgh it along with the 4 page brouchre i had filled in day 1]
HR: You are a keralite
Me: Yes madame
 HR:Tell me about yourself
Me: [I hadnt prepared this part and talked whatever that came into my mind.]
… and all i wanted to do was to be in computer industry. I didnt mind
whether it was programming or anythig else. I am good at drawing and was
very much interested in animation industry. So i had planned to join academy
of animation at Trivandrum. Just then my father got transferred to
Chennai… [and then some build up]
 HR: You have a lot of extra curricular activities
Me: [Smiles. Though not to say "yes madame" too often]
HR: What do you do as placement coordinator of your college? 
Me: [Told her what i do. She's impressed ]
HR: There are a very few companies that come to your college. So are you doing anything about it?
Me: Presetly we have a continuous flow of compnies coming in. We have CTS coming next and then US-Tech. We have created a profile of the college and would be approaching the HR of companies once the schedule get over. Apart
from that we are desinign a website for the purpose of placement.
HR: Ok good
[Durgesh had told that he is the secretary of CSE and organised Eklavya. She was confirming it with each one of us.]
HR: So did you have symposium?
Me: Yes madame. Our is a very famous national level symposium. We had created the website for it and presently we are creating a website for our college as i had told before since the look and feel of the present website is not attractive.
 HR: Where have you mentinond you created the website in your resume?
[She showed the resume to me and i pointed it out to her. It was in the first page. I had written it under project]
 HR: oh ok. Eklavya…. Team size 2. So what were the role of both.
Me: I created the front end in ASP.NET and she created the back end in SQL Server 2005.
 [She goes though the brochure]
HR: It says you are a Microsoft Student Partner. What is it actually?
Me: Microsoft student partner programme is one in which Microsoft selects student from a few colleges who are passionate about technology to act as an interface between Microsoft and the students. We conduct events at different
colleges for students to make them aware of the latest technologies around them. We give them training and certification. We are not paid for this madame. Its a community service.
HR: What does “we” refer to?
Me: We referes to the Microsoft student partners. There are 60 in India.
HR: Just 60 in whole India?
Me: Yes madame
HR: oh ok. So Microsoft directly selected you?
Me: Yes madame. Microsoft directly recruit us and we work very closely with them.
HR: What is the selection criteria?
Me: If you are passionate about technology and is aware of whats going around, they take you.
HR: What was the selection process?
Me: I had three interview, a technical interview and a GD.
HR: Nice
Me: So you talk about Microsoft products?
HR: Well madame, thats what they actually want us to do. But i do not support any particular technology. The reason why i like this is I get to meet people, talk with them. interact with them. I get chance to involve myself in the organisation of premire Microsoft events like “TechEd”. To orgranise such a big event, there are a lot of hurdles. I have to talk with people, cordinate it, schedule it and many other things.
HR: So you get to interact with people.
Me: Yes madame. We peronally get to know the project managers behind every product of Micrsoft. If you ask me who is the person behind Visual Studio Mobile, i would say Mr. Sriram Krishnan
HR: Hmmm…. so you get the exposure. What is “TechEd”?
 Me:TechEd is an international conference for developers in which we showcase the latest technologies to be released by Microsoft. In India it is orgranised at major cities and known as “TechEd India”
 HR: Oh really! When was it conducted in chennai?
Me: On June 16th and people from Infosys was among the participants
 HR: Where was it held?
Me: At CHennai Trade Centre
 HR: Oh! CTC. Now i remember. Yes yes. I didnt get it first. ok ok. So you organise those events.
Me: Yes madame
 HR: So how are you benifited by this?
Me: Well, we get genuine Microsoft products… [pause]….. and errr… T-Shirt, Pens.. you know, those things [The pen i was holding was also Micrsoft]
 HR: [Laughs]… so you are benifited by it….. [Laughs] [After a pause] Ok What is Road Show?
 Me: In Road Show, we took the Microsoft bus and travelled to cities like Chennai, Madurai, Cochin, Bangalore, Mysore, Pune, Hyderabad and stayed there for few days. During this time we conducted events at various colleges around that city to make them aware of the latest technologies.
 HR: ok good
Me: [Smiles]
 HR: ok now. I will give you some puzzles {…..time of death….} I will give you the same that i had given to others. [Gives a paper with 3 questions and asks me to do the first one. That was the problem like 8 men can do a work in blah blah blah]
Me: {blinks. I had not prepared for Infosys itself. Then how can they expect me to prepare aptitude???}
 HR: [waits patiently to see what i would do]
Me: [Not sure what to do. Take out the pen. Scribbled something that even i didnt understand. That was the same question she had asked Durgesh and I was thinking "Durgesh saaale, if you had told me the answer, i would have
escaped"]
 HR: [Sees what i am writing]
Me: [aware that she was watching i gave up] I dont know madame
 HR: [tries to help me out] 8 men 4 days. 2 days later 2 more comes. So?
Me: [so what???? Just a blank stare]
 HR: ok. I think you dont know to approach such questions.
Me: [Thank god finally puzzles are over]
 HR:…. i will give you another one
Me: [&%^%^*%%^%*$*^%]
 HR: [Opens a small album with lots of questions. It was an easy problem. I was confident that i can do]
Me: [Starts doing. But i was so exited that i couldnt do. After trying for a minute] Can i take my time?
 HR: I will give you 1 min
Me:[1 min??? Bye bye Infosys. Better luck next time]
 HR: Ok tell me what you are trying to do
Me: [I knew the logic well and so explains it]
 HR: Ok. But why did you write 2/30?
Me: Thats wrong madame
 HR: ok [takes the paper and closes album]
[The interview was over and she leaned back relaxing. I too closed my pen and got ready to get up.Suddenly...]
 HR: Prathul….
Me: [Looks up]
HR: Prathul….. what is the meaning of your name?
Me: It means “not comparable” madame
HR: What language is it?
Me: Sanskrit madame, in bengali its light
HR: Amazed!!! YOu are bengali
Me: No madame. My parents were in cuttack when i was born and my grandfather proposed the name
HR: [Smiling] Its a very sweet name. I like it
 Me: Thank you madame <blush> [...alternatively, sorry madame, i am booked!]
HR: This is the first time i am hearing that name. Its really nice.
Me: Thats actually an advantage. You do a google search in my name and all the results would point to me. Whereas when you do a search in a common name, the result could refer to anybody
HR: [laughs] thats right
 Me: [what next]
HR: So Prathul, all the best. Hope for the best.
Me: Thank you madame [Gets up, takes a few steps back and then turns]

[I had written that I have been placed on 8.6.2006 in HCL in the Infosys brouchure. But she didnt ask anything about it]

Outside i was relieved, but disappointed that i couldnt do both puzzles. Since i was the last person the results came within 5 min. When sir showed us the list myself and Durgesh thought that it was the rejected list since there was 12 of us. But no, that was the final selected list. Yipeeeeeee!!!

And hence here I am, a prospectus employee of Infosys Technologies joining Mysore on 26th Nov

Infosys Interview- Day 1 November 6, 2007

I will write this part in detail so that in case someone is attending Infosys in future, this would be helpful. But please not that u need to prepare, I was just too lucky.  

The next day I got up late only to realise that I had promised to attend the interview. :O I logged on to freshersworld.com, took the printout of question paper that Infosys had conducted at St.Joseph on july 8th and rushed to Tagore in G18. I was pretty sure that i wouldnt make thorugh the aptitude and so instead of Shakunthala devi book, i took the latest edition of CHIP magazine that had come the night before and my MP3 player with me. While travelling in G18 i went thorugh the St.Jospeh paper. Once I reached the venue, I found everyone reading “Shakunthala Devi puzzles to puzzle you, or
more puzzles”. Having nothing else to read, i read the CHIP magazine. (The MP3 battery was down since i was listening to it all the way from my house to college) . The pre-placement talk didnt take place since it was already 11:30am. So they went on with the exam.

They first give you a four sheet brouchure which you have to fill up. You are supposed to paste your passport size photograph on it. Also we need to write down passport number, eye vision, blood group, total marks, avarage marks etc. (some of the details I bluffed coz I had absolutely no idea ).
The first test was 10 aptitude questions for a duration of 1hr. The following are some of them that i remember:
1. <Forgot>

2. Something like that flipping coin and if they lose, give 1$ to opponet. Here it was chocolate. A won 12 times. Finally B had 8 chocolates. How many min game has to be player to attain this figure. (Ans: 32)

3. A girl goes to restaurat with some money. Half at book +1 rupee to begger. Again half at restaurant and 2 rupees tip. Half at book store+ 3 rupees donation. She is left with 1 rupee. What was the initial amount.
4. A murder case. 5 people, conditions. Who is the murderer. (Did it well, but misintepreted one statement and got the answer wrong. I got someone stating with W as murderer, actually it was Fillip i think)
5. The temperature problem. A=14 B=36 A=133 B=87. When will both be equal. (Forgot the formula, but managed it by writing the steps in a way neighter me, nor the person who is correcting can understand)
7. 2187 coins. 1 is fake. Fake one is heavier. You have to find the minimum ways in which you have to weigh it to find the fake one. (Ans:8. Divide it into sets of 3 and weight it)
8. A merry-go-round (like in childrens park). One person says-” The sum of One third of children ahead of me and three quarter of children ahead of me is the total childeren in this merry-go-round”.Find the number of childeren. (Very interesting problem. Try it out)
9.A very complicated statements. About 16 statements and 4 questions. Very confusing. Left it. DIdnt even touch.
10. Two series problem.
The invigilator snatched the sheets at sharp 1:00pm. I had attempted only 8 and was pretty sure i will never make through. The next test was Verbal for 30 minutes which was easy considering there was no negative marking. Only 3-4 words were tough to answer which, i had to flip the coin. Everyone around me, excluding me was very happy that they had done all ten problems correctly. I packed up my bag and decided to go home. Just then Sharad (my best friend ) came and told that he needed to take reume prinitout. (He had just reached that morning from Shillong and was completely unaware of the test). So myself and Vishal went with him to Vandaloor and by the time the whole thing finished, it was around 4pm. I had called up my home and told that i will not get thorugh. Anyway since it was alreadylate, i decided to go back to the college.
At college, before results were announced, there was pre-placement talk. Almost was certain that i will not get through, i didnt listen to it at all. Instead kept telling myself that “HCL is the best”. They played a 5 min video which covered the mysore campus. Mysore campus is the biggest traing facility in the world (It is the best place to work at). Finally the results were announced college wise. The most funniest moment was when a guy had written that day’s date in
place of his Date Of Birth. The HR said, this guy is born today, so lets all wish him happy birthday. The way he said was really funny.

Our college results were the last. I had made up a mental picture of the people whowould be slected… Durgesh, Balaji, Prathibha……blah blah blah. Myself, Sharad and Vishal were talking and was not really listening to what was
going on. Suddenly Vishal said that they have called my name. I thought he was jocking since myslef having done “soooooooooo well” in aptitude, getting thorugh was Mission Impossible 4. Everyone said that they had called my
name. I couldnt believe and so waited till evening 6:30 to see the result displayed in the notice board. And yes, my name was there… god knows how. Oh btw Jinxed Durgesh had also cleared the written.

Jinxed ‘Durgesh’ (Infy continued) November 6, 2007

Durgesh or Durgi as we call him is one of the good friends of mine. But Durgesh has a strage thing happening with him. He attended 9 companies already and in all 9 he reached the HR round, but never got the job. He is a bright student, well spoken and no one could understand whats going wrong. The night before Infosys interview was Polaris inteview. The inteview went late and at 12:00am they were waiting for result at Satyabama Engg Coll. I called up Durgesh and he told that the HR had told him that he will be more than happy to have Durgesh in the company. But he was not so optimistic due to the things that happened with him in previous interviews. He vowed that if he didnt clear Polaris, he wouldnt attend Infosys the next day. I was planning to attend only if he was attending.

At 1:00am the results came and Jinxed Durgesh didnt make it this time too. Depressed he said that he is not attending Infosys the next day coz he was too tired after the tiring long day. I told him to give it one last try for the sake of it and promised that I will attend the test with him.

Why Infosys? November 6, 2007

In tamilnadu we are not allowed to attend any more campus placement if we got into one. After all HCL was the No:4 in India and I was more than happy with it. A month passed and most of the student were placed in one company or other. Then came Infosys with a bang!!! But then they realised that they had come too late and that most of the student were already placed. Hence they got into talks with management that they would come for recruitment if and only if students placed in other companies attended too. Finally the management caved in!

When my PO told me about this I told him that I have no plans of buying RS Agrawal. He told me that its ok and told me to write for the sake of the company. (To be continued in next post…)

An interview with HCL November 6, 2007

HCL came for campus placement at the end of 6th sem on 7.6.2006 (a day before my birthday ). Ours being a deemed university always had one subject more than Anna Univ. I had engineering economics exam the next which I had not prepared much coz I thought I was good at it (good example for over confidence).

I was always allergic to preparing aptitude and stuff. Not even once gone though that big fat book known to any campus recruit as RS Agrawal. I took prior bail from my parents that there is no chance I would make it coz this was the first one plus I had Engineering Economics exam the next day. The night of 6.6.2006 after returning from that days exam I searched the net for question papers. In all questionpaper people who attened HCL before had written that questions are the same everywhere and that there are just 30 questions. The order of questions is changed, but the answer remains the same. I checked this and it turned out to be true. :D Immeditely I took printout of the quetions with answers, forwarded it to my friends and mugged up all the answers. That night I had a very sound sleep.

Next day high in spirits and higly confident I reached college early for the written test. I should say I was the coolest guy there coz I had the questions. My friends to whom I had given the question were not very confident that the same questions would come and hence they were preparing.

Anyway at 12pm the test started 3hrs late. When I got the paper I was stunned. It had 50 questions: 20 technical and 30 aptitude. I totally freaked out and wanted to run away from the hall. Not even one question came from what I had mugged up. Anyway I had to write something. So I started with technical which I should say I was good at. Did about 18 in that and moved to aptitude. Somehow I managed to do about 3/4th of that. But the problem was that we needed seperate pass in each paper. After the exam we had lunch and results was to be announced at 3pm.

From 2pm all of us were in the hot and conjusted auditorium of Tagore Engg College. The kept us waiting and tensed till 4pm. One by one they started announcing the names on mike. After about 5 min my heart skipped a beat when my name was called. The selected student were divided into batches. I was in Batch A and hence my interview would be on the same day. Now I really started worrying about Engineering Economics test the next day.  6 of us were sent to a senior HR for interview. This guy turned out  to be a very strict one. While other HRs were asking casual questions, this guy was asking C,C++.Java, Sumatra etc. Thanks to my friends Pavithra who was the first one to go in, she told me the questions asked to her secretly. Also thanks to almighty god, I was the last one called in and was well prepared with the questions.

I was made to wait in another room for 5 min and then another HR came and told that I have cleared technical and was supposed to attend HR on the same day. The HR panel consisted of a male in mid age, a male and female who looked like love birds. The lady was wearing a sleevless dress and the guy had something in chinese or japanese tatooed to his hand. The middle aged HR did most of the talking and at times he was requestion the other two to ask something. Finally the young lady gathered enough courage to ask “Tell something about yourself”. Thats when I learned that no matter how much you prepare the answer for that question, you will go whitewashed in the interview.

For each and everything I told about me, they asked to give examples which I think I did well. I am good at talking people into things. Finally the interview was over and the mid aged HR asked whether I have any question. I really wanted to ask the meaning of the tatoo, but didnt want to screw up my first interview after having reached so far. So instead I asked some technical question and they answered that. He then said that I may leave. I was disappointed. He didnt say whether I was selected or not. When I reached the door he said- “Come early tomorrow and get your call letter”

I reached home very late at about 11:30pm, had a nice sleep and the next day after my exam I went to get the call letter. I had got a job on the day I was born 20 years back… 8.6.86 ….One of the best moments of life

The ads I love… November 6, 2007

Vodafone: Life of a Mayfly

A very beautiful ad used worldwide which shows the life of a Mayfly. When Vodafone came to India this was translated to hindi and aired.

“The common mayfly has a life expectancy of just one day.But is he miserable about it?Not one bit.He fills his day with the things he loves.Just think …If we embrace life like the mayflyWhat a life that would be.

Make the most of now.”

Reliance: Apun Ka Sapne

Baat kitne be chote ho, sapne chote nahi hote!

End of Boring Posts: Officially November 6, 2007

Yaawwwnn… I am getting bored of talking about the past. Just know that life at Chennai was fun. I worked with Microsoft and also was part of a technology group called “The Knowledge Foundation” .Learned a lot of useful stuff, made a lot of good friends, did things I have never done in my life before.  But maybe I will tell you the funny story of how I got placed in Infosys and HCL, thats a real funny one.

Y2K-07 Problem:( November 6, 2007

 

When I published the post, all the dates in which I originally wrote has been changed to the date on which it got published. So I manully edited the date and switched some to September, few to october and starting from this post, everything will have original date.

This blog is now public!!! November 6, 2007

After much thinking, finally I have decided to make this blog public. This blog was originally meant to read “Random Musings Of A Demented Mind”. But this name will be changed anytime soon to reflect my personality (as one of my good friend says).